


Unmoored

by standalone



Series: Fucking Political Bullshit exR Coffeeshop AU [22]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: (and so are they), 2021, Fear, M/M, Speeches, attempted coup, if you came here for political bullshit you are in luck, unrest, we are going to be okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-07
Updated: 2021-01-07
Packaged: 2021-03-17 22:27:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,340
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28607493
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/standalone/pseuds/standalone
Summary: “Will we play political games while real people suffer or will we win righteous fights together, standing shoulder to shoulder, for the good of Georgia, for the good of our country?” —U.S. Senator-Elect Rev. Raphael Warnock (D-Georgia), Jan. 5, 2021
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables)
Series: Fucking Political Bullshit exR Coffeeshop AU [22]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/610273
Comments: 35
Kudos: 60
Collections: Recs from the Watchalong Room





	Unmoored

"Our democracy is not our buildings. Our democracy, unlike a door, cannot be broken down. Degradation is not destruction—and indeed, no force on earth stands stronger than one that has borne the ignominious attacks of cowardice, cruelty, and greed, only to emerge truer, purified by its journey through the viciousness that tried and failed to destroy it.”

*

Grantaire woke up to his phone chiming. He usually sleeps with the ringer turned off, but for some reason he left it on last night. Maybe because he went to bed so late, having wanted to watch out the news before sleep.

He cleared his schedule today on purpose so he could sleep in—but since he _did_ leave the ringer on, he might as well check out whether this message mattered. 

He blinked at the bright little screen, then sat stark upright.

 **Enjolras:** I'm okay. We're safe

This is not the kind of message that makes a person feel great about the day that is dawning around them.

 **Grantaire:** What's happening???

But he was already flipping open a laptop, pulling up the news, and holy shit, the fucking Capitol building.

He shouldn’t have slept in. He should’ve been awake to see this. He could have been losing his shit for a _while_ now, not all at once like a tidal wave slamming him directly out of the cozy caress of sleep and into this pit of terror.

He read the message again, once, twice, a dozen times.

 **Enjolras:** I'm okay. We're safe

 _That is not fucking good enough_ , he typed back, then erased it.

 _Where are you?_ he typed.

_The news says there’s shooting._

He erased them all.

_I love you._

Fuck fuck fuck.

He paced the apartment for a while, put on water for coffee, hopped into the group chat which was of course blowing up and then felt extremely guilty that he always keeps the group chat muted because it’s too much dinging and makes his mind feel explosive.

Fucking explosives. There are going to be explosives, probably, if these idiot shitbags have any fucking idea how to throw a coup.

 **Eponine:** Buncha imbeciles

 **Eponine:** They don’t know what they’re doing here, just takin a look-see

 **Combeferre:** It certainly appears that they have little objective beyond breaking and entering

 **Courfeyrac:** I keep thinking of NPC attackers in old castle-defense games

 **Courfeyrac:** Just waving their clubs and charging

 **Eponine:** But in the game when they get in the game’s over

 **Courfeyrac:** Yeah, these shitbags have no idea about endgame

 **Combeferre:** Still no word from Enj?

 **Grantaire:** Oh shit, I’m so sorry

 **Grantaire:** He texted me. Says they’re safe

 **Grantaire:** That’s it, though

He poured boiling water on the coffee grounds and watched them swell, absorbing the liquid at first, before it began to drip through the holes at bottom into his mug.

It was almost an hour later before one of his calls went through.

“Babe. Oh my god. Babe.”

“This is some real shit, Grantaire. Serious.”

“Are you really okay? Where are you?”

“We’re in one of the safe rooms. There are a bunch. We’re really all right.” He laughed, a laugh that sounded authentic even in the background din from whatever was happening all around him in whatever last-bastion-of-democracy bunker he was holed up in. “They brought in lunch.”

“To the safe room?” Suddenly, with Enjolras talking to him and the news on TV showing the scraggliest, sorriest invaders wandering the overrun Capitol like lost sheep, he started to laugh too. “So everyone’s just, like, chomping sandwiches in the dark while someone upstairs puts down the coup?”

Enjolras just laughed back, a little giddy now. “Oh fuck, I love you.” There was a long pause while someone else talked to Enjolras, only tiny snippets making their way into Grantaire’s ear, and then Enjolras came back on. “I have to go. I love you.”

“Don’t get killed.”

“I’m not getting killed,” Enjolras said. “I’m writing. At some point, we’re going to get out of here, and when we do, the senator is going to have some words.”

*

"Today, I am not scared. I am furious. Today's attempted coup was willed into being by the desperate mind of a would-be despot clinging to power. He invoked hatred and fear and violence. He signaled, once again, that he will stop at nothing.” Rather than wavering after the day’s turbulence, the senator’s voice resounds, imbued with purpose.

"Our buildings are symbols. It hurts to see them overrun. But over and over again these last four years, we have been witness—if not accomplice—to innumerable attacks on our nation's principles, its values, its imperfect but essential foundation. That the bombardment should become physical comes as no surprise. 

"I proudly represent constituents who immigrated to this country seeking refuge from political upheaval, seeking the stability that America had promised. Today, I am ashamed of the pettiness and chaos they saw here. I am ashamed to know that today's children will grow up less certain than ever before of the steadying power of checks and balances. I am ashamed—not that our Capitol building was breached, but that it was _surrendered_ by those tasked with its protection.

"To our law enforcement, I direct absolute censure. How could you extend to these—" she pauses, gathering strength, and through the miles and the TV, Grantaire feels a moment’s gratitude that the condemnation in her eyes is not for him, "—these _insurrectionists_ a grace and lenience that you repeatedly, gleefully withheld—in _just this past year_ —from those peacefully protesting for civil rights? No one can look at this gross double standard for behavior and come to any conclusion except that those entrusted with the common safety are instead concerned with maintaining white supremacy. No one can look at this injustice and conclude that our nation's police forces can offer even the _semblance_ of justice for all.

"From my colleagues who did not immediately decry today's riots and disavow the rioters, I ask no apology, for there can be none. Instead, I demand the immediate removal from office of anyone who would dare to aid, abet, or urge this assault on our nation's democracy. Such a person has no place in government. 

"Our nation is full of greatness. We woke today to a morning full of glad tidings, and we will soon sleep sounder in the knowledge that the will of the voters is to depose this intolerance. But this intolerance is also American. It is an American heritage of which we must not be proud, a heritage we must examine hard and discard, because if we do not, this hatred will spite us all, and it will destroy us.”

Grantaire has had too many coffees and not enough food. He’s still in his pajamas. He hates to watch politics without Enjolras here to talk shit and drop inside scoops. On his own, it’s just a few speeches’ worth of powerful emotion punctuated by everyone else’s monotonous drivel and grandstanding. Even if it all culminates in declarations of a victory, that victory ought to have never been in question in the first place, and it all feels like such a fucking sham.

Lamarque, on screen, laughs bitterly, like she’s sharing Grantaire’s thoughts. “You all live here in the same world as me. You all know we cannot rightly say that our country, that we are _better than this_. We’re not. Today is evidence of that.” She shakes her head in a look of stern disapproval that Enjolras has unwittingly adopted after years working at her side. 

It’s through Enjolras, he realizes again, picking up his cold coffee, that he loves this place where he lives. It’s through his belief that somehow, we can remake this ragged colonial palimpsest into something worthy of us all.

“But we have choices to make, and if we make those choices carefully, if we choose human dignity and kindness and love, then I believe that we _can_ be better. We must be better. If we wish our country to survive, we must.”

**Author's Note:**

> For posterity, I've logged tiny notes about the actual events that precipitated these fics [here](https://docs.google.com/document/d/1JbdI1DieYfdR0i2zc1mheugKqdnJzEQKSPJvIE8O734/edit?usp=sharing).


End file.
